"The last 24 hours have been really busy.  I eventually managed to get a good trim for my Code 0 and managed a few extra miles thanks to that sail, until the wind increased too much. The change to Solent and dropping of the gennaker was really full on – to be on the bow of Roxy as we surfed the big swell at 20 knots was quite impressive. I seemed to be either 6m in the air (as we took off) or under water (as we landed!). It was good exercise, but there is no room for the smallest of errors out here.  It seems that Roxy likes it windy.  However, Roxy was craving attention yesterday, and in the evening she decided to give me some technical challenges. The first was one of my alternators failing to start up. I have two, plus other ways of charging, but down here with the pilot on high gain settings, we are using quite a lot of electricity and working alternators are imperative. Luckily, after chasing cables I found the loose connection and the repair was an easy one. Obviously, Roxy was not happy that I had fixed her so efficiently, so problem number 2 quickly arrived. I had just changed down to staysail as there was 35-40 knots of wind, and when I went to cant the keel back up...nothing happened! Again, I have a back-up manual pump on my keel system, but it takes all day pumping to move the keel just a tiny way, so that is not really an option.  So, in the dark, with my head-torch, volt-meter and tools, I found myself head first in the batteries and keel hydraulics as Roxy hurtled down the huge waves at break-neck speeds! I would have much preferred to be in bed, but in this race, a problem must be fixed immediately to ensure it does not get worse. Luckily, again, I singled out a faulty solenoid and managed to re-cable the system to bypass the defective part.  "
Sam Davies (Roxy) in her daily message

 

"I really don't really want to see any ice because I saw enough last time round to last a lifetime. It is clearly marked but I don't want go anywhere near. It's so hard to see anything when you are going at this speed and you can't go on deck for any length of time because it's so wet and cold. The radar is on but there is a lot of wave action so you don't know whether you are in it until you see it. You can't slow down. You just have to stay away from where we know they are and keep your fingers crossed. It's the so called little ones - the ones that are less than 50 metres, which I reckon are still pretty big - that are the dangerous ones but you can't have a strategy for icebergs. You just have to be vigilant. There is no point in sitting on deck for 24 hours a day - you can't see in the dark."
Dee Caffari (Aviva) in her daily message

 

On Thursday evening, Marc Guillemot's monohull Safran hit a UFO causing the rudder to kick up.  A simple broach resulted, but it could have been much worse, as for Yann Eliès (Generali), who broke three battens, when his rudder kicked up and the boat rounded up. The result for him was ten hours of hard work at slow speed with the mainsail on the deck.

 

"I have just had my worst night since the start of the race... I struggled for hours in the night during the black and icy squalls trying to get the gennaker furled. I was afraid I wouldn't manage it. Once rolled up, it came unrolled and became a real mess. It even got tangled up with the genoa for a while… Help!!  At one point I saw a shooting star and I made  wish that the boat was tidied up before the end of the night.  Just as I was slipping into my duvet, the pilot failed.  The boat broached and went over on her side, with the keel and ballast on the wrong side, heeled over at 90°.  Everything inside went flying, clothes, duvet, books, tool box... Everything is soaked. In the end the boat was tidied up by daybreak, so now I believe in shooting stars."
Jean-Baptiste Dejeanty (Groupe Maisonneuve)

 

The Canadian, Derek Hatfield (Algimouss- Spirit of Canada), crossed the longitude of the Cape of Good Hope at 22h47 UTC on Thursday 11th December. The final two sailors due to cross the virtual line are Raphaël Dinelli (Fondation Océan Vital) and Norbert Sedlacek (Nauticsport-Kapsch) sometime this weekend, as they still have around 450 miles to sail.

 

"This morning at around 06h UTC in a very strong gust, my forestay broke. I was able to recover the genoa. The rigging is intact. The weather is very bad.  There's a force 6 NNW'ly  wind, but gusts reaching force 9.  Now I'm surfing at 22 knots just with the mainsail with two reefs."
Norbert Sedlacek (Nauticsport-Kapsch) in an e-mail this morning